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The " Lord of the Rings " : a Reader's Companion ReviewThe Lord of the Rings - A Readers Companion - 2008 revised - paperbackI remember when I was at college, struggling to read Ulysses by James Joyce. I had a book of annotations to my side and was struggling to understand chapter 3 of Stephen Dedalus's adventures on the Sandymount Strand in Eire
This book is rather like that book, but I think its more of a joy to read. Although this book is not for a person who has never read the Story (it will probably give away the ending for a start!) I think its pretty worthwhile for a person whos read the "trilogy" (of SIX Books! in three Volumes!) more than once
If you've read Lord I think you'll really enjoy this. Its engrossing, and (to be honest) too much in depth (I don't really care to know what words mean in Elvish!)
So this book works well but you don't have to read EVERY bit, like the Ulysses Gifford guide. Tolkien was in love with words being a philogist, names of places and people had to mean something. His pose in the work was as a translator of the work into Westron, the Common Tongue, so you get (for example) Samwises real name in the original text as Banizir
So I can think the attention to detail can get overwhelming (what Samwises name is in Sindarin, etc).
So I do think its a great book, but it can get overwhelming. Tolkien created a history for the work, and as great a book as this is (its the best book I've read on Tolkien, up there with Lord of the Rings actually) it might be best if you just take it in small doses. Listen to the Lord of the Rings on audio cassette and read along with this book for to start.
Again, it helps if you're intimate with the Lord of the Rings. Its not unusual for people to read Lord every year (like me). If you have read it a few times, I think you will really enjoy this book, as its an intelligent, in depth study of the work, page by page
I mean, its 900 pages of annotations, and it has a nice "dip in" quality, and it is an absorbing read
Just make sure you've read the Lord of the Rings a few times first though, otherwise you might end up throwing the Companion aside in frustration, just because of the minute attention to detail.
See, Tolkien worked out phases of the moon, dates, and so forth; after Books 1 & 2 (which comprise The Fellowship of the Ring) it becomes convoluted, with Book 3 (Two Towers is comprised of Books 3 & 4 - 4 dealing solely with Frodo and Sam's mission to Mordor) starting off with Aragorn speeding up the hill of Amon Hen (on February 26) and ending with Pippin riding with Gandalf to Minas Tirith the night of March 5/6 - with different characters intercepted at different times throughout that particular Book. By contrast, Book 4 (picking up Frodo and Sam) starts in median res at February 28 and ends with the capture of Frodo by old Sauron on late March 13th, a full week later than the end of Book 3. So in few, the time periods to each book are not always concurrent - that is, starting at the same time and ending at the same time
So to keep track of moon phases, dates, meanings of words in one huge tome is quite something. Clearly the Lord of the Rings is (in Tolkien's phrase)a matter that "got out of hand" rather quickly. Original drafts of early chapters of the first book had the Black Rider hunting for the Shire hobbits originally being Gandalf, comically surprising them while leaving Hobbiton - in the comic vein of the earlier book The Hobbit, to which Lord was a sequel; this incident became much darker with Gandalf turning to a Black Rider STALKING the hobbits before they even left the Shire!
This book keeps track of events, words (lot of archaic words need to be defined - and not everyone knows that a league is 3 miles!)
As brilliant a book this is (I've read it once thus far, all the way through) I do have to wonder who its for... As I've said, you can't just pick up this book if you're not really familiar with the Story as you'll get rather cross and fling it aside because you'll be confused about references to Westernesse (aka Numenor) and so forth. (Westernesse is the land lost by betrayal by Sauron at the close of the Second Age when the king took up arms against the Valar in the West.)
I think it would also help if you had a passing familiarity with The Silmarillion, even if just reading about it in the excellent Tolkien for Dummies book, which touches on the Ages previous to the events of the War of the Ring (at the close of the 3rd age)
I think reading the Silmarillion might be too much for some people (I found it tedious and not as engrossing as the Lord of the Rings) so perhaps finding a synopsis would be best. I do think it would help that you read the Lord of the Rings a least a few times before picking up this work (this IS a review of the Readers Companion); it really helps if you know the Lord well, to sum up. Otherwise this work might be too frustrating a read, and you won't know the worldThe " Lord of the Rings " : a Reader's Companion Overview
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